Lights... Camera... ACTION!!: A Hollywood Quest

Movie Pitch: The Squadron


In 1842 brothers Adisa and Adebisi are Yoruban survivors of the collapse of the Oyo Empire, they live in the region of Anago in the city of Itakete.

However a raid by the Agojie Amazons of the Kingdom of Dahomey strikes the city and the two brothers are taken despite attempts to fight back, the Agojie kill many of their friends with rifles and slaughter those wounded with their knives, afterwards, the two brothers, despite being wounded, manage to hide their injuries, being spared from the knives of their captors.

The two brothers are dragged to the Capitol of Dahomey, Abomey, where they witness Portuguese and Spanish diplomats speaking with the councils and King, while the Dahomey military has military parades. Adisa overhears plans to sacrifice the less healthy and fit of the prisoners and sell the rest to be sold in the US, he hopes to continue to hide his and his brothers injuries and then start an uprising when on the boat.

However Adebisi's wound has become infected, and he begins to shake and struggle to stand, when the slaves are made to stay standing out in the sun for an entire day to test their fitness, Adebisi collapses, despite Adisa's attempts to keep holding him up. Adisa is forced to watch his brother be slaughtered alongside over a thousand other 'weak' and sickly slaves, their bodies tossed in a mass grave as the King of Dahomey watches, before accepting payment from the Spanish and Portuguese for the remaining healthy prisoners, who are quickly forced onto prison ships by the Dahomey soldiers. Adisa himself finds himself on a ship called 'Theresa'.

In the horrific cramped conditions Adisa almost goes insane, realising his plans to stage an uprising will never work, he is kept from killing himself with a loose nail by Diekololaoluwa, a former merchant and his pregnant wife Bolanle, the three bonding even in the horrific, cramped, conditions on the slave ship, Diekololaoluwa teaching Adisa Spanish and English he picked up as a merchant.

Bolanle goes into labour, and the Portuguese sailors refuse to help her, using the nail, Adisa manages to pick the lock and tries to help her give birth, other slaves giving him advice to try and help him. Unfortunately Bolanle dies due to a sickness that had spread amongst the slaves, and her newborn daughter is stillborn, Adisa lies to her as she dies, telling her the baby was born healthy.

The Portuguese throw both corpses overboard to Diekololaoluwa's horror and dismay, alongside the corpses of the other slaves who succumb to the sickness, however, as they finish they see a Union Jack flying in a ship approaching them, they try to flee but are caught by the HMS Actaeon. The slaves are freed by the British, given food and water and brought to a base on the Ascension islands. Adisa is told that the British ship is one of the anti-slavery West Africa Squadron warships that are blockading the continent.

However the slave colony there is overly cramped, Adisa and the others find that there is little to no room and food and water is scarce due to overcrowding, sickness is also an issue. They petition the British Captain who saved them, George Mansel, asking if they have to stay here, he explains that repatriation to Africa will take time due to the chaotic situation there, he gives them the options to stay and wait to possibly return home, go to try and live anew in the Caribbean or join 'The Squadron'

Adisa and Diekololaoluwa are at first dubious, but are convinced when Captain Mansel tells them of John Perkins, a Black man who rose to the rank of captain in the Royal Navy over 30 years before, and they decide to join The Squadron. They find that as many as a fifth of the other crewmen they will join are former slaves freed by The Squadron, however despite this they are pressured to take 'normal' names. Adisa is renamed Adam, Diekololaoluwa, who is the most reluctant to take a British name, is derivatively called Lucy, even when he gives in and chooses the name Derek.

The two are assigned to the HMS Tortoise under the new Governor of the Ascension isles, Captain Frederick Hutton. The Captain is surprised by the presence of black sailors being offered to help crew his ships, and dubious, he pushes many of them off to the Ships Tender, HMS Snap.

'Adam' attempts to befriend the white crew mates as he and the other freedmen sailors learn more about how to crew a ship, the movie focussed mainly on two, a London born conscript called Oliver 'Ollie' Muse and an Irishman called known only by his nickname 'Jackal Jack'o'. Jackal rejects any association with the black sailors and discourages the young Ollie from any form of kindness, encouraging racial conflict and abuse towards the black sailors.

Derek believing they have been duped into being slaves to the British instead of being sold to the Americans as they have not been allowed leave or pay yet, attempts to plan a mutiny to seize the Tortoise using the crew of the Snap.

Adam is at first reluctant, until one night when he is allowed onto the Tortoise for his rum ration, Jackal beats him while drunk, during the confrontation Ollie runs away, and Jackal knocks over a lantern that briefly starts a fire on the ship. Despite Jackal being drunk on duty and starting the fight and fire, both men are lashed. Adam decides to help the mutineers.

When the black crew start to sneak aboard the Tortoise the next day, their plans are halted by the spotting of a slaver ship being chased by two British vessels, the HMS Rapid and the HMS Dart. Tortoise and Snap help capture the vessel, the ship Tentador, and Adam and Derek are some of the first to storm aboard.

The crew of the Rapid and Dart both treat the black crew with respect and their own black crew mates with respect as well, being veterans of The Squadron who have seen too much of the slave trade to hate. Meanwhile the crew of the Tortoise, after seeing the horrific conditions of the slaves kept within the Tentador, halt their abuse and discrimination. Ollie outright coming to apologise and asking for Adam's help praying over the bodies of the slaves who passed away shortly after their rescue before they are put out to sea.

Derek refuses any thought of reconciliation, but Adam and the other black crewmen begin to mix with the white crewmen, Captain Hutton now mixing the crews of the Snap and Tortoise together instead of enacting segregation.

Jackal refuses to apologise, but his abuses stop, one night Derek comes across him when he's drunk. Jackal talks about how he cannot get the conditions of the ship and those who died out of his mind and considers jumping into the ocean. Derek encourages him to do so, and even prepares to push him, but Adam and Ollie's arrival causes him to instead save Jackal, thinking he's changed his mind, Adam asks Derek to help teach Ollie how to read and write, but Derek refuses and laments that Ollie and Adam's presence forced him to save Jackal or be charged with murder.

Captain Hutton calls Adam into his offices one day and asks him why he joined The Squadron instead of settling down in the Jamaicas. Adam relays the tale of Captain Perkins, but Hutton corrects him. Perkins was of mixed descent, and it took him almost half a century to earn his appointment to Captain, of a mere ten gun ship, despite being a man of great talent, capturing over 300 ships during the war of 1812. Hutton warns that, people in the navy will be like he once was, and won't understand, like he once didn't, the importance of what The Squadron is doing, he hands Adam a large bonus and advises he uses it to buy some land in the West Indies.

Adam relays the truth of the story to Derek, who offers to share his pay with Adam so they can buy land and live in peace in the black communities in the West Indies, Ollie finds out Adam plans to leave and is crushed by his friends decision, however, both Adam and Derek decide to delay their decision when they hear about a raid on a Spanish slave factory called Lomboko.

Alongside the Royal Marines, the crew of the Snap and Tortoise and several other Royal Navy ships will storm the island and defeat the Spanish garrison. Derek and Adam and much of the black crew volunteer to join the Royal Marines in the first wave, Ollie also volunteers even when Adam attempts to discourage him and to the surprise of many Jackal also volunteers.

The British forces storm the beaches under the canon duel between the ship and islands garrison. They manage to overwhelm the outer fortifications but it quickly becomes a brutal battle trying to push into the second layer. The Spanish begin a counterattack attempt.

Derek is badly injured by a Spanish bayonet, but is saved by Jackal, who begins to drag him towards the back lines, stating 'I can't apologise for being a right bastard if we both die'. Jackal is then shot, but continues to try and drag Derek to safety even as he demands Jackal leave him and save himself. Jackal is forced to release Derek when a group of Spaniards charge them with Bayonets, he helps Derek up and the two counter charge after sharing a sip of Jackals whisky flask, and telling each other their real names, Jackal revealing his name is James and Derek reclaiming his name Diekololaoluwa, they die alongside each other.

Adam and Ollie find themselves trapped in a foxhole together, believing they'll die to the canons and bullets, Ollie pours his heart out, telling Adam he is the first friend he's had who ever thought he could or should learn to read or write, instead of just being sent to a poorhouse.

However the second wave arrive and drive the Spanish back, Adam snatches up a falling Union Jack flag, but passes it to Ollie, telling him he's worthy to him. The two rejoin the attack and Lomboko falls.

Jackal and many of the British soldiers who died are buried in the island, but Adam insists that Derek and the other black soldiers be sent out to sea 'to be with the ones we lost to get here'. Adam and Ollie discuss things and decide to both retire from The Squadron and pool their money to buy land in the West Indies, Captain Hutton states that, if Adam was born in England and 'the right colour', he would get the recognition he deserves for his courage during the fighting, maybe even a medal, but unfortunately that is not how the world works yet. Hutton does give Adam Derek's money and several of the white sailors pitch in with donations to help him buy land with Ollie.

The movie ends with Adam and Ollie sailing away from the Ascension Islands, and looking towards the sunrise as they sail to the Americas.

Before the Credits role the movie talks about The West Africa Squadron, noting on screen that it captured over 1500 slave ships, and released nearly a quarter million slaves from captivity from 1808 to 1856, ending the international slave trade.




Notes:
This is not a perfect movie, this is not intended to be, while the ships were actual Royal Navy vessels in the west Africa squadron in the 1840's and the slave ships are actual slave ships captured by the same Royal Navy vessels they are in the pitch, and I did find real Yoruban names, places and equipment for the Dahomey Amazons, there are major exaggerations in regards to the battles, the timeline should be across 7 years but movie time so…and yeah, there's a lot of cliches, because this is a script meant to be written in the 80's. I hope no one is offended.